


sonder

by fingerlick (bluedreaming), kaithartic (bluedreaming)



Category: Chronicles of Narnia (Movies), EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-03
Updated: 2015-07-03
Packaged: 2018-04-07 10:26:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4259853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluedreaming/pseuds/fingerlick, https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluedreaming/pseuds/kaithartic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Do you ever look at strangers," Susan asks, "and wonder what their lives are like?"</p><p>Lucy looks at her and shrugs. "Sure," she says, "but they're strangers. If you want to know, you have to make them not be strangers anymore." She takes another sip of latte and smiles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	sonder

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [23emotions](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/23emotions) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Sonder:  
> (n) The realization that each passerby has a life as vivid and complex as your own.

It's warm, the sun shining outside, sliding sideways through the glass of the streetcar window, Susan blinks as a particularly warm ray trails across her face. It's hot, now, and she can feel the sweat beading on her neck, between her thighs, the scratchy lace of the the tops of her stockings touching with her legs crossed. _Why did I wear stockings again?_ She doesn't know.

It's ten stops still to lunch, where she can meet Lucy. It's been busy lately, too busy, school and friends and a dorm that never seems to sleep, tuba in the hallway at three in the morning and that show-off Tom reciting Shakespeare in the breakfast hall while everyone is blinking over porridge. Susan loves it, it's everything she imagined but sometimes it's nice to stop, take a breath.

Dress up for no reason, just to feel nice. But she's really regretting the stockings now, they're long and sleek and she feels so nice wearing them, it's like a special present to herself but right now everything is hot and sticky and she forgot her headphones in her room so she can't even listen to music—she glares at her phone and scrolls through the apps but nothing appeals.

The streetcar stops at the next stop, and even more people pile on, Susan looks out the window and pretends not to look at the people from the corner of her eye, the endless inexplicable anxiety, _will someone sit next to me? Or will their eyes flicker over the empty seat and pick a different one, or worse yet, elect to stand?_ She knows it's a groundless fear, people have so many reasons for the things they do and yet she can't dislodge the thought from her head, where it hangs about, poking at her feelings.

Susan uncrosses and recrosses her legs, shifts her small purse on her lap, examines her fingernails. _I should paint them,_ she thinks, except nail lacquer is itchy and makes her fingers feel stiff and unwieldy. Maybe next time.

The streetcar pulls away from the stop and the seat next to her is still empty. Susan exhales, not sure whether she's relieved or strangely disappointed, letting her head fall against the warm window glass even though she knows it will flatten the brown waves of hair. Lucy will only laugh, it's okay.

She's startled out of her dreamy reverie when someone sits down beside her, twitching upright in her seat in surprise.

"Is it okay if I sit here?" a voice says, a boy, maybe her age as Susan looks over, a pink flush spreading over her cheeks in mild embarrassment for making him think he needed to ask. _He must think me so rude._ She nods, once, and her eyes flick away to stare at the back of the seat in front of her. It's fascinating, really, someone has written a phrase from somewhere on the old leather. 

_You are just an extra in someone else's life story._

The words make her pause, eyes darting back to peer at the boy beside her. He's busy on his phone, maybe instagram, but she doesn't want to seem nosy so it's hard to tell. He's smiling though, it wrinkles his eyes up and makes her want to smile too.

He seems nice, and Susan finds herself wondering what his life is like. Who he is. Where he's from. His hair is a rich black and she imagines him combing it in the mornings, maybe a brown plastic comb. She can picture it between his fingers that are currently tapping away at the screen.

He laughs then, a bubbly sound and Susan wonders what he read. Maybe his friend posted something funny? All of a sudden, she wants to know what it is. Today, Susan is a girl taking the streetcar from her dormitory across the city to meet her sister for lunch at the art gallery. She's a Susan who looks nice, hair scrunched up in a lazy knot, glasses perched low on her face as she reads through the required reading, _Journey to the West_ and _Dream of the Red Chamber_ for Chinese literature class, a Susan who's been told she looks elegant and cool in silk, a string of her mother's pearls around her neck and black patent heels, a Susan who's hot and sticky, itchy stockings and stiff feet today in the streetcar. Susan is Susan.

She wants to know who the boy is. What does he like? Is he used to hot weather? He's wearing a blue t-shirt, scoop-necked and his collarbones are a lovely line below his neck, silky skin and his nimble fingers tapping on the screen of his phone. His bottom lip is pursed, he sucks it beneath his top teeth and lets it go again, slightly wet from his mouth. _He's cute,_ Susan decides. He looks like he would be a fun friend, as he smiles fondly at something on his screen, she catches a glimpse and it looks like a small white dog.

Susan has always wanted a dog but it's not possible in the dorm. She feels almost. . .envious. Not specifically, just a general feeling. She wants to know this boy, not necessarily _know_ him but, like a butterfly that flutters into view during a picnic, only to be chased by curious children, ignoring the countless other butterflies drifting over the meadow, fluttering colorful wings, Susan has fallen in curiosity.

 _Should I say hello?_ she wonders, and tries to convince herself _yes_. She's just opening her mouth, after three other attempts, this time she'll really do it, already turning her head, when the streetcar stops again and the boy stands up.

 _No!_ she thinks, but it's too late, he's leaving, nodding absently at her, even polite in this, to a complete stranger, as he tucks his phone into his pocket and joins the other passengers disembarking the streetcar. Susan is left, sitting in her seat, hand hovering slightly above her leg as if about to reach out—she lets it fall back onto her stocking-clad thigh.

The lace of the stockings is still itchy, but she's not thinking about it. Susan looks at the stop, the central library, and she wonders if the boy is actually heading there, or it's merely a stop along the way. _Who are you?_ she wonders. _What is your life story?_ But he's gone.

"You're kind of distracted today," Lucy says, grinning over her latte at lunch. She has her hair in a bob again, and Susan would tell her she likes this hair style the best except she's still thinking about the boy.

"Do you ever look at strangers," Susan asks, "and wonder what their lives are like?"

Lucy looks at her and shrugs. "Sure," she says, "but they're strangers. If you want to know, you have to make them not be strangers anymore." She takes another sip of latte and smiles.

Susan sits and looks at her Americano and thinks, as the black liquid swirls lazily in the cup.

**Author's Note:**

> originially written for [shiritori](http://writetomyheart.livejournal.com/340191.html)


End file.
